The picturesque peeling, reddish-brown bark makes the cinnamon maple an exception and probably the most valuable maple species in the world. The visual icing on the cake is the yellow to red-orange color explosion of the leaves in autumn. These instructions for home gardeners explain whether so much exclusive beauty hides sophisticated pruning care.
When and how do you cut a cinnamon maple?
A cinnamon maple typically does not require pruning, but if necessary, it is best to prune between November and January. Remove dead branches and shorten branches that are too long in one- to two-year-old wood without cutting into the old wood.
Pruning is unnecessary and counterproductive
A look at its habitus reveals that cinnamon maple does not need regular contact with pruning shears. On the contrary, careless cuts can significantly impair your charismatic appeal. In the Central European climate, the Chinese maple species usually thrives with multiple trunks, slowly and with a sprawling funnel-shaped crown.
An Acer griseum always thrives when it remains undisturbed by pruning. Mother Nature endowed the Asian beauty with an exotic, bizarre appearance that cannot be optimized through horticultural interventions.
Pruning tolerance allows pruning if necessary
If cutting the cinnamon maple turns out to be unavoidable, you will benefit from its robust cutting tolerance. How to cut an Acer griseum correctly:
- The best time is after the leaves have fallen between November and January
- Do not cut cinnamon maple in temperatures below freezing
- Thimout dead branches
- Cut back branches that are too long and disturbing in one to two year old wood
Maple trees generally find it difficult to sprout new growth from old wood. Therefore, limit pruning to the growth of the past two years. It is advantageous for further growth if you place the scissors a few millimeters above an eye or leaf node. Longer stumps invite diseases and pests, which a cinnamon maple tree is spared from under normal conditions.
Education to become a standard bearer is a long process
A cinnamon maple cannot be purchased as a finished standard tree at the tree nursery. The slow growth makes cutting training a lengthy and therefore expensive undertaking. Thanks to its good-natured pruning tolerance, home gardeners can train a young plant into an elegant standard stem by continuously pruning.
Tip
Cinnamon maple is the only type of maple that doesn't scare a gardener when the bark peels off. This process is considered a symptom of the dreaded sooty bark disease in other maple trees. On the cinnamon maple, the very thin peeling, cinnamon-colored bark gives the tree an exclusive and unique appearance.